Breaking Reality - Blog Posts
Tool-Assisted Speedruns Out of Context
In only one week, @TASNoContext speedran becoming my new favorite Twitter account. TASVideos publisher EZGames69 posts short clips of old games freaking out when they receive frame-perfect sequences of gamepad input. Already, the tool-assisted madness has consumed Contra III, Sonic 2 and 3, Pokémon Yellow, UMK3, Donkey Kong 64, and dozens more.
Edit: In less than a year, the Twitter account is retired because some idiot billionaire bought Twitter and did his own speedrun of destroying it. Tool-Assisted Speedrun Clips has moved to Tumblr.
Source: @TASNoContext media posts after their clip of pirohiko & FinalFighter's TAS of Mega Man
Katrina Yu – Witching Activities
When foraging for /r/FloatingIsFun content, sometimes I find something with a special mass appeal. Katrina Yu is a crazy talented photomanipulation artist that loves levitation. This gallery on Bored Panda features her as a witch going about her daily life. There’s plenty more from her on Reddit, Behance, Flickr, Tumblr, Instagram, and Redbubble.
Have you ever wondered what witches do on their ordinary days? I like to think that they’re always there, living among us and witnessing the world’s ordinary miracles. So this for Halloween, I imagined a daily life of a witch and tried to recreate it through my work.
Source: Katrina Yu
Magnetro – Marvel vs Capcom 2 - Ataraxia Combo Video
We’ve seen tool-assisted Marvel before, but Ataraxia takes it to new heights with camera hacks so we can see some previously offscreen setups. Combo scientists like Magnetro treat MvC2 like a puzzle game where they can create a bouncing Colossus, interruptable Ruby Heart supers, and Dhalsim’s rapid-fire turban attack. Leave it to Magnetro to put out a five minute video that takes a 38 minute video to explain.
Source: Magnetro via YouTube subscription
Bill Wurtz – here comes the sun
We made it through 2020! Better times await! Bill Wurtz disappeared for a year, and as it turns out, he spent the year learning Blender. This glorious 3D acid trip is just what we need. I love this style and I want to make a game that looks like this someday. I’m getting back into creative stuff, too. See you soon!
Source: Bill Wurtz via YouTube recommendations
Stéphane Picq – Fractalian Space
30-Day Video Game Music Challenge (Super Hard Mode) Day 28: Music that makes you nostalgic From MegaRace (DOS, 1993)
My first CD-ROM game. It came with our Windows 3.11 computer. MegaRace isn’t very good, but it gave us Lance Boyle and some early 90s CG videos that we get to drive on.
Source: YouTube, challenge by OverClocked ReMix I think?, via NintendoCapriSun
Brad Fuller and Hal Canon – Silly Race
30-Day Video Game Music Challenge (Super Hard Mode) Day 18: Music in a game released the year you were born From Marble Madness (Arcade, 1984)
The first FM sound chip in a video game. That poor thing… Normally, we’d game over first, but this song’s pitch and speed can keep on increasing until the sound chip can’t handle any more.
Source: YouTube, challenge by OverClocked ReMix I think?, via NintendoCapriSun
chanomach – ナナメから世界を見たって、何もいいことはない ／ Enjoy correctly.
Hi, Internet! I apologize; I’ve been pretty glitchy lately and things have been crazy, what with the weddings and holidays and conventions and all. My cross-posting pipeline is broken so I have to write the same posts four times. That’s too much work!
My stream is erratic, too, but I’ve been experimenting with restream.io to stream to Mixer, Twitch, Smashcast, and Facebook all at once, usually on Friday nights. Once the cartridge is reseated and things work again, I’ll try to relaunch the blog and the stream. These experiments have been fun, though.
Source: Chanoma.ch
ナナメから世界を見たって、何もいいことはない ／ Enjoy correctly.
普通でいいんだよ。
Dr. Fatbody - Sonic the Hedgehog 1 at AGDQ2019
Awesome Games Done Quick 2019 brought us a Sonic 1 run by Dr. Fatbody, a highly entertaining player with the speed and precision of a yung Wumbo. He tries risky tricks that backfire sometimes and will goof off a little for style. When everything works, he’s really fast! He reminds me of my own playaround style, and now I know why. He’s also from the fighting game community and plays Zangief in Street Fighter V! It all makes perfect sense now.
Source: Games Done Quick via GeekNights
TwistedJiko
I have news on my highly anticipated, long delayed project! Jiko and I got engaged under the blood moon! I can’t wait for more magic and adventures with the love of my life and our family. I wouldn’t have it any other way.
Source: Jiko
#4 ‘Spell’ Now with color!
TerminalMontage – Something About Super Mario 64
Super Mario 64 is fun to speedrun and fun to break. YouTube animator TerminalMontage captures this pretty accurately in this animated 0-star speedrun. I’m heading to GDEX to play some local indie games and break them, of course. EDIT: GDEX got too serious and too expensive, so I actually didn't go.
Source: Something About Super Mario 64 ANIMATED SPEEDRUN (Loud Sound Warning) ⭐️ 0 Stars 01:49 Legit Non-TAS via Jiko
Super Mario Land 2 – Memory Exploration
Retro Game Mechanics Explained is an educational video series from Super Mario World speedrunner Dotsarecool. In Super Mario Land 2, it’s possible to glitch yourself right out of the map and into other regions of the Game Boy’s address space. Wandering around those garbage tiles and randomly flipping bits will usually crash the game, but it’s possible to trigger the ending credits from there. This reminds me of the game-breaking screen warp glitch I played around with in The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening v1.0.
Source: Retro Game Mechanics Explained via YouTube recommendation
sh/f Super Fireball Battle
Now that I’ve got all my WordPress posts on Tumblr, what should I do with it? How about I introduce a tool-assisted video Sonic Hurricane debuted at Evo2k10? Evenly matched projectiles and beams clash like it’s Dragon Ball Z. This video got me into Shinichi Osawa’s album The One and the soundtrack to DoDonPachi Resurrection Black Label.
Source: Sonic Hurricane via RSS feed nearly eight years ago
Oddheader – 100 Things You Didn't Notice in Tony Hawk Games
In the PlayStation 2 era, I spent thousands of hours playing the Tony Hawk games online and making levels and videos. We’d get out of bounds and explore behind the scenes, and sometimes find the developers left some easter eggs for us. Oddheader has compiled the community’s findings into one epic 24-minute video that takes us through Neversoft’s entire run with the series.
The transition from WordPress to Tumblr is about 75% complete. 108 WordPress posts became 120 Tumblr posts (20 are Tumblr reblogs). I lose the mouseover text on images, Twitter embeds, and email updates, but most things work and I’ve fixed about a dozen broken links.
Source: Oddheader via related videos for a LiangHuBBB Dragon Ball FighterZ video
PiNe – Trick or Treat!
I haven’t done one of these artist posts in over a year. Let’s fix that with PiNe. PiNe delivers vivid scenes and cool character designs in a handy RSS feed.
When I saw this on today's Pixivision Halloween post, I knew today I'd have to post this too. Google Translate translates the Japanese title to "I do not have to make sweets!"
Source: PiNe – Trick or Treat! via Pixiv
“Trick or Treat!”
Happy Halloween ☾
PiNe – Lemonade
Another one of those scenes that only works in fiction. Where would I get a glass this big? So refreshing!
Source: PiNe – Lemonade via Pixiv
レモネード - LEMONADE
GameHut Coding Secrets
GameHut is a YouTube channel run by Jon Burton, founder of Traveller’s Tales and producer of Lego games and movies. His series on Coding Secrets dives deep into the Sega Genesis versions of Sonic 3D Blast and Toy Story to explain how he achieved those great graphics. He really used all the resources to do things the hardware was never meant to do.
Source: GameHut via YouTube Recommmendations on Did You Know Gaming? videos
Upside-down Compositions – pixivision
When you see a picture with a person upside-down, reality might be broken somehow. Maybe the room is constructed upside-down. Maybe a character isn’t falling downwards for some reason. It’s probably just a reflection anyway. I unsubscribed from dozens of my RSS feeds until I could clear my 2,500-item RSS backlog. One of the survivors is pixivision, formerly pixiv Spotlight.
Illustrations where characters are upside-down or where the background is inverted are called upside-down compositions. There’s no doubt about the fact that you’re gonna be curious about these extraordinary compositions, and will wonder “what exactly is portrayed here?”. These compositions have a light, carefree feeling to them, and will make you want to float along with the characters in them.
This time we collected a number of upside-down compositions, that will make your head turn (or you can just flip your smartphone or PC screen!). Enjoy!
Yes, I'm spelling pixiv with a lowercase P now. And just like last time I posted a pixivision article (then called pixiv Spotlight), I'm presenting this image the way it appears in my RSS feed, or at least how it used to before the format changed a little bit. I have no idea what this illustration's title translates to. Clicking the image will take you to the pixivision post.
Source: DSmile – かがやーくきぼーーがーこのまーちーをー via Upside-down Compositions via pixivision’s English RSS feed
Tissot T-Touch Expert Solar with World Order
Anime Hell once again delivered the Japanese weirdness at Ohayocon. I expected that 2016’s Japanese commercials would be just as good as 2015’s. The one that surprised me was a Tissot watch ad as a music video for the band World Order’s song World Order. I wish all my clocks could sync up like this band. This reminds me of OK Go.
Source: Tissot YouTube via Anime Hell
Pannenkoek2012
Super Mario 64 arrived in North America twenty years ago today. I used to speedrun it badly. Pannenkoek2012 is still finding new ways to exploit game mechanics and collect stars with as few A button presses as possible. This involves accelerating to relativistic speeds to travel to parallel universes. On his second channel, he uses programming logic to explain cloning, health, enemy behavior, floating point arithmetic, and more.
Source: Pannenkoek2012 via YouTube related videos
Keiichi Matsuda – Hyper-Reality
Oh no, is this how augmented reality will end up? Graphic designer Keiichi Matsuda imagines Medellin, Colombia with a glitchy layer of graphics, apps, and ads covering it from top to bottom. These things are fine on my phone because they go away when I put my phone away. With augmented reality, there’s no escape.
Source: Hyper-Reality via TwistedSifter
Girls and Space!! – pixiv Spotlight
These girls should be very dead. If I could survive without heat, air, atmospheric pressure, and radiation protection, then I’d wish I could float around in space too. Maybe they can do it because it’s cool, or maybe they’re robots? pixiv Spotlight posts twice a day in English, and this one’s about girls in space.
In a far off place not yet known to us… the cosmos!! Humans have long before wanted to travel through the universe… a very romantic idea! Ever looked up at the sky and just wondered about the Milky Way? Today’s Spotlight is about the fantastically magical cosmos… with girls! Mysterious and awesome, all at the same time. Check them out.
I wondered how I should reblog a pixiv Spotlight. For now, I'll copy the behavior of pixiv Spotlight's RSS feed, with one image that you can click to get to their full post. I hope this is OK. I mean, technically I should be spelling pixiv with a lowercase p and Nanahime as NaNa_HI_ME.
NaNa_HI_ME – Yume no Hoshi
Source: Girls and Space!! and ななひめ – ゆめのほし via pixiv Spotlight‘s English RSS feed
TASBot Plays Brain Age
Awesome Games Done Quick is known for its highly skilled human players, but TASBot’s tool-assisted runs stole the show today. In Brain Age, TASBot draws pictures and text that are somehow interpreted as numbers. It’s like Ryuto’s famous Brain Age TAS, but with a live audience?
(The run starts at 15:22.)
Source: YouTube via Games Done Quick
Mortal Kombat Arcade With NBA Jam Sound
What happens if you swap out Mortal Kombat’s sound board for one from NBA Jam? YourMKArcadeSource had some extra Mortal Kombat and NBA Jam boards and gave it a shot. As it turns out, you get a totally playable Mortal Kombat with a confused announcer that loves to say “Nuggets!”
Source: YourMKArcadeSource via Nathan Phillips and Now You’re Playing With Podcast
Minion in the Museum
Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery had this Despicable Me minion balloon stuck on a high ceiling. When it finally came down, the security cameras caught footage of it wandering the museum like it had a mind of its own. Whenever I get a balloon, I add weight to it to get it to silently float around like an Air Swimmer. It’s a rare sight, and if you don’t expect it, you might think it’s a ghost!
Source: Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery via WHDH via Google News
Rob Scallon – Enter Sandman (backwards cover)
Rob Scallon is back and he’s really outdone himself this time. His cover of Metallica’s Enter Sandman was played in reverse on each instrument, then reversed back around the right way in editing. Even the vocals were sung in reverse! As always, he has fun with the video.
Source: YouTube and YouTube via TwistedSifter because YouTube broke their Subscriptions RSS feeds
Metallica’s Enter Sandman… BACKWARDS!
Jennifer Greenburg – The Rockabillies
I’ve got a soft spot for the most eccentric geeks who go a long way to live how they want, even if it’s weird. As it turns out, there’s an entire Rockabilly community for recreating the lifestyle of 1950s America. It’s not just about having retro clothes, furniture, and appliances, but also about repairing and maintaining those things for decades instead of replacing them like we do now. These people must be a blast to hang out with.
Source: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2543580/The-people-STILL-living-like-1951-Captivating-portraits-look-inside-Americas-Rockabilly-community.html (which sources Jennifer Greenburg) via DJ Ranma S on Facebook
Chocolatey
Chocolatey brings the power of Linux’s package manager to Windows, letting you download and install applications from the command prompt. Either that means nothing to you or you’ve already clicked the link because you couldn’t contain your excitement. I reinstalled Windows yesterday and used this to quickly get my applications back.
If Chocolatey Gallery has an application I want, I open command prompt as administrator (Windows Logo cmd Ctrl+Shift+Enter) and run choco install and the application name. With no further input, Chocolatey downloads and installs the package, avoiding unwanted add-ons. You can add dozens of applications in one choco install command and it installs them all one-by-one. To update everything, just do cup all.
Git is revision control software used mainly for software projects. BakaMo Studios uses a TortoiseSVN and a Subversion repository to do that. Choco doesn't just install TortoiseSVN, but Unity and Tiled too! Seriously, this thing is good.
Source: https://chocolatey.org while finding an alternative to Ninite
Amemura
It’s about time I did another pixiv post with mouseover text, right? Amemura keeps showing up in my recommendations with these eye-catching beautiful skies and vertical locations. The artist has recently started posting their new work on Tumblr and Twitter, so they’re easier to follow now.
Lake of Twilight (黄昏の湖)
This is Salar De Uyuni, Bolivia, the largest salt flat in the world. When it rains, the entire salt flat turns into a mirror. Trippy! Artists and photographers love this place.
You and I (きみとぼく)
If I could see this clearly underwater, I'd go scuba diving all the time. Having things above and below you and swimming up and down to meet them must be a lot of fun.
At the End of Summer (夏の果て)
Here's another place that looks like it probably exists. This girl must be a globe-trotter.
Dive
Here's a place that does NOT exist. Are we skydiving or scuba diving? Or both? Whatever it is, it's cool! The artist also has one of scuba diving in space.
Dream
Sweet dreams! Unless you're seeing this post in the morning. In that case, sorry I just made you forget whatever dreams you had.
Source: http://www.pixiv.net/member_illust.php?id=47488 via pixiv Spotlight
Kevin Birrell – Ti Classic Grand Master
Tetris the Grand Master 3 has the subtitle “Terror-Instinct”. KevinDDR has become the sixth player in the world and the first outside Japan to tame this beast and earn the rank of Grand Master in Classic Master mode. Only the best players who can get to and and beat the invisible credits roll consistently earn the right be tested for Grand Master rank, and Kevin pulled it off under pressure. Congratulations!
I really should have posted this one last night. Kevin's a friend, and I should have realized that his run was on YouTube and could have been blogged about. Sorry about that. Click for the full-size image.
Update: Replaced the unofficial AGDQ YouTube archive with the official one.
Sources: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-_b6H8dHHm0, Games Done Quick YouTube (was the unofficial YouTube archive), and Kawaiikochan Gaming No Korner
GRAND MASTER!! “DEMONIC GAMESOFT
It’s Comics for the recent amazing feat. It looks like a foreigner has obtained "Grand Master,” huh… we’ll discuss “Gosh, that’s difficult”. What’s more difficult, in gamesoft? Shiranai~
It’s a news piece on such a subject. It’s IIDX. Dolce vs “Mei.” It’s “Dodonpachi Crazy Run”.
It’s the Last Dragon and “The Master.”
It’s “Patreon Fan/Fun Club For The Support Of Kawaiis”.